The present invention relates to a bed for supporting a patient, including a hospital bed. More particularly, the present invention relates to a bed having siderails and an articulating deck to support a mattress.
Hospital bed and other patient supports are known. Typically, such patient supports are used to provide a support surface for patients or other individuals for treatment, recuperation, or rest. Many such patient supports include a frame, a deck supported by the frame, a mattress, siderails configured to block egress of a patient from the mattress, and a controller configured to control one or more features of the bed.
According to one embodiment of the present invention, there is provided a bed for supporting a patient. The bed includes a frame, head and foot supports coupled to the frame, and a deck coupled to the frame and disposed thereabove. The deck is longitudinally movable from a first position to a second position toward the foot of the bed. The deck includes a lowerable foot deck section initially disposed substantially above and between the head and foot supports when the deck is in the first position and substantially outside the head and foot supports when the deck is in the second position.
In accordance with another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a bed for supporting a patient including a frame, head and foot supports coupled to the frame, and a deck coupled to the frame and disposed thereabove with the deck including a lowerable foot deck section. The bed includes means for moving the deck relative to the frame from a first position to a second position towards the foot of the bed so that the lowerable foot deck section moves from a first generally horizontal position to a second generally vertical position.
A further aspect of the present invention includes a method of elevating a patient supported by a bed deck having back deck and foot deck portions from a horizontal position to a chair position. The method includes moving the bed deck longitudinally from a position disposed substantially between head and foot supports toward a foot portion of the bed until the patient's legs are disposed distally of the foot support of the bed, raising the back deck portion of the bed deck from a substantially horizontal position to an elevated position, and lowering the foot portion of the deck to a substantially vertical position adjacent to and outside the foot support of the bed.
Pursuant to another aspect of the present invention there is provided a method of moving a foot support section of a deck of a hospital bed from a generally horizontal position to a generally vertical position. The method includes moving the deck relative to a frame of the bed toward a foot end of the bed and permitting the foot deck section to move due to gravity from the generally horizontal position to the generally vertical position as the foot deck section moves past a foot end of a frame.